Mug Shot Doesn't Flatter Supervisor

Phillip Matier, Andrew Ross

Published
4:00 am PDT, Friday, October 13, 2000

A bottle of suntan lotion that was allegedly boosted during a Hawaiian vacation eight years ago is coming back to burn San Francisco Supervisor Leland Yee. Yee, who faces re-election in a tight and testy seven-way race in the very foggy Sunset District, this week found himself facing an old mug shot taken at a Hilo police station after he was picked up allegedly for shoplifting, of all things, an $8.09 bottle of suntan oil.

The story?

Well, according to County of Hawaii Police Lt. Ed Tanaka, shortly before 4 p.m. Dec. 19, 1992, Yee walked out the KTA Superstore in Kona's Keauhow Shopping Village -- with an 8-ounce bottle of Tropical Blend Tan Magnifier oil in the front pocket of his shorts.

A store security officer stopped him, and the police were called.

Yee told the arresting officer it was a mistake, but he wound up being hauled down to police headquarters anyway, where he was booked and photographed on suspicion of petty misdemeanor shoplifting.

An official at the Kona District Court tells us that authorities didn't prosecute the case because Yee -- who was serving on the San Francisco School Board at the time -- subsequently disappeared, apparently having returned to San Francisco without notifying law enforcement in Hawaii.

A few weeks later, in January 1993, the case was "closed without prejudice," meaning the charges could have been reinstated had Yee returned to the island. But he didn't, and the case eventually slipped into the bowels of the Hawaiian judicial system.

Until now, when Yee finds himself in the middle of a hot race, and with some enemies who were willing to dig deep to do him damage.

"I didn't do it," Yee said, without elaborating on the allegations. "I'm going to give you one comment. Willie Brown is a major a--, and you can quote me on that. And instead of spending $500,000 trying to smear me, I hope he spends a million dollars because he's wasting his goddamn money."

What's Yee talking about?

According to Yee campaign spokesman Jim Stearns, "The real story is downtown interests . . . spending tens of thousands of dollars on private investigators to dig up dirt on independent candidates" like Yee.

And Stearns may have a point . . . at least up to a point -- although there's no indication that Mayor Brown is behind this.

Records, however, do show that at least one of the groups who oppose Yee paid $12,000 to the San Francisco "opposition research" firm of Voraga and Rice.

And indeed, the mayor's allies at the "downtown" consulting firm of Barnes, Mosher and Whitehurst confirmed that they did steer at least half that money into opposition research into Yee -- in the hope that it would help their preferred candidate, Tom Hsieh Jr.

But Mark Mosher insists his group played by the rules, only culling information from the public record.

The boys from Barnes, Mosher and Whitehurst aren't the only ones digging deep into Yee's past -- in fact, it seems to be open season on the two-term supervisor.

"What can I say?" said one critic. "He's ticked off a lot of people in the past four years, including his own former supporters. Now it's payback time."

Ironically, Yee -- a frequent and vocal critic of Mayor Brown -- was so upset about rumors of the Hawaiian punch that he called Mayor Brown last week and asked him to find out who was behind the play.

The mayor expressed sympathy, telling Yee that he understood the embarrassment it would cause.

"But after a couple of phone calls, it was clear that this was way past the rumor stage," Brown said.

And indeed, this week, the infamous San Francisco "white envelope" drops began hitting local newspapers and radio stations, containing both the Hawaiian mug shot and short court record.

For the record, this wasn't the only time Yee had a misunderstanding with police.

Twice last year, San Francisco police pulled Yee over -- suspecting that he was cruising the Mission District in search of prostitutes. In both cases, police questioned Yee and let him go on his way. Yee confirmed the cop stops at the time, but said in both cases he was the victim of mistaken identity.

GORE GULPS: It may be the debates, it may be the Middle East -- but for the first time since the convention in L.A., Democratic strategists here are breaking out in a sweat over the way the race is shaping up for Al Gore.

In the past two weeks, inside polls show that even in Democratic-happy California, Gore's lead against George W. Bush has been chopped down to the "mid-single digits."

"He's kicking it away," said one very nervous Gore partisan following Wednesday night's debate. "If it weren't for the turn to questioning Bush about Texas in the last half hour, it would have been a slam dunk for Bush."

To make matters worse, a plummeting stock market and a week of international crisis -- including yesterday's terrorist attack on a U.S. Navy ship -- have created some politically choppy waters for the incumbent vice president.

"Do I think Gore is going to lose California?" says Democratic pollster Paul Maslin. "No -- but the new polls confirm the national trend" showing the momentum swinging toward Bush.

OOPPPS: The other day we mistakenly identified the law firm of Canterbury and Rauff as doing polling for Mayor Brown. Ed Canapary is the pollster. Sorry for the confusion.

GROUNDED: VP candidate Joe Lieberman's visit to the Bay Area this week was a groundbreaker in terms of money -- even if it didn't get off the ground.

The Connecticut senator flew into San Jose at 7:15 Tuesday evening and promptly motored up to the home of Stanford business wiz Joel Hyatt.

There -- with some help from Bill Bradley, Steve Jobs and Mayor Willie Brown -- Lieberman hauled in a record $3.2 million, or roughly $17,777-a-minute for the three-hour stay.

Unfortunately for Lieberman, he didn't leave the bash until 10:30 p.m. -- which meant he was late getting back to the airport, late getting on the waiting plane and worse yet, unable to get off the ground before the 11 p.m. takeoff curfew.

And even though they were strapped in and ready to go, Lieberman and his entire entourage dragged themselves back off the plane and set about scrambling for hotel rooms for the night.

Even then they didn't get much sleep, because at 4:30 a.m. the wake- up calls started ringing for a substitute 6:30 a.m. flight out -- commercial, no less.